Last Friday was the 4th Grade annual tradition, Gold Rush Day at the park next to the school.  This was a parent run event and needed many volunteers.  I did not sign up to be one of the chairs but I had committed to help, so I took the whole day off.  Every volunteer and student were encouraged to dress up, so I bought a pioneer women outfit for the day.  Logan did not want to dress up initially but finally agreed to wear a plaid shirt with jeans. 

     Friday morning I arrived early to help; my station was the Assay Station and I met up with the chair mom at our station.  Some dads were putting together the wood shack for us, so I did not really have much to do.  I walked around to check out our stations, General Store, Ma’s Kitchen, the saloon, the game station, an Asian Experience and the photo station.  Right before the school bell, I also walked back to the school to meet up with Stuart who arrived with the boys.  I hung out with them briefly, and took Connor to check out the Gold Rush site before he had to head back to his class.

    When 9am came, the 4th grade classes slowly arrived; I think we were expecting 140 students.  The event were well organized; the kids were divided in smaller groups of 15-20s or so each and they were assigned to go to different stations at different times.  One of the groups was led to the nearby creek to mine for gold first, and 30 minutes later, our station had our first customers.  The kids came to us with the gold they mined and we helped them weigh them with the scale and gave them cash in return.  Some kids really filled their small muslin bags full of gold stained rocks.  Every time when there was a break between groups, I would walk around to check out what Logan or other kids were doing.  I saw Logan working at the Ma’s kitchen peeling carrots and enjoyed eating the carrot afterward.  The saloon was a popular spot as the kids learned to play roulette and blackjack.  I never headed down to the creek, but we heard that it was quite nice down thee and kids had fun finding “golds”.  In the middle of park, there was also a jail; there were sheriff going around arresting kids and taking them to the jail.  Some kids were thrilled to be arrested and had to do some pushup or jumping jacks to get out of jail.  By lunchtime, the groups took turns breaking to eat, and afterward, my station had only one more group to serve.  Afterward, Logan happened to be at the saloon, so I spent some time watching them play Blackjack and they definitely had fun there.

   By 2pm, the event ended and the classes gathered to sing a song and thanked all the parents.  This was a fun and educational event for the children.  Logan told us that he had a good time and he especially liked the saloon and the Asian Experience where they played a die game.  I guess the gambling games really got the kids attention